Russia backs up equity market

President Putin has called on the Russian government to invest surplus oil revenues into stocks of Russian blue chips, to support the country’s equity market after shares of blue chips such as Gazprom and Rosneft lost 18% and 10% respectively.

Russia’s main indexes MICEX and RTS have slipped by more than 2% this year after a strong advance in 2006.

“We have seen the growth of prices of energy carriers and at the same time we witnessed certain stagnation on domestic stock market. The government should think what can be done in such unusual conditions to correct this unnatural situation,” said Mr. Putin.